{"id":586,"date":"2004-02-04T13:11:29","date_gmt":"2004-02-04T21:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2004\/02\/04\/some-links-amp-has-read-lately\/"},"modified":"2004-02-04T13:11:29","modified_gmt":"2004-02-04T21:11:29","slug":"some-links-amp-has-read-lately","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=586","title":{"rendered":"Some links Amp has read lately"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>The Massachusetts High Court <a href=\"http:\/\/apnews.myway.com\/article\/20040204\/D80GHPF80.html\">has ruled against &#8220;separate but equal.&#8221; <\/a>The Massachusetts constitution requires same-sex marriage; civil unions aren&#8217;t good enough. (I&#8217;m both frightened of the potential backlash and nonetheless pleased with the ruling.) Via <a href=\"http:\/\/www.marriagemovement.org\/\">MarriageMovement.org<\/a>.\n<li>On MarriageMovement.org, Elizabeth Marquardt is worried that an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2004\/02\/03\/international\/europe\/03GERM.html?ex=1391144400&#038;en=f80233cb54c29170&#038;ei=5007&#038;partner=USERLAND\">exhibit of preserved human corpses<\/a> is a sign of a &#8220;a serious devaluing of life.&#8221;\n<p>First of all, it&#8217;s unclear why a fascination with biology and even death requires a devaluation of life; it seems plausible that the fascination with biology and death is driven by a high regard for life&#8217;s value.<\/p>\n<p>Second, even if there is &#8220;devaluation of life&#8221; here, it&#8217;s doesn&#8217;t indicate anything new about current society. In the nineteenth century, traveling corpses were a common feature of carnivals; the corpses of executed criminals were particularly popular. (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.snopes.com\/horrors\/gruesome\/mccurdy.htm\">One such corpse <\/a>kept on being exhibited &#8211; passed on from carnival to circus to funhouse &#8211; until the late 1970s. By that time, the origins of the corpse had been forgotten, and the folks exhibiting it thought it was a realistic-looking dummy. The truth was discovered while the corpse was being used as a prop on <i>The Six Million Dollar Man <\/i>tv show.)<\/p>\n<li>Elizabeth also linked to news about the <a href=\"http:\/\/abclocal.go.com\/wtvg\/news\/130_cannibalismtrial.html\">German cannibalism case<\/a>: the eater was sentenced to eight years &#8211; much less than the life sentence the prosecution had hoped for.\n<li>Two useful reference pages from The Center for American Progress. The first, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.americanprogress.org\/site\/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&#038;b=24970\">&#8220;In Their Own Words,&#8221; <\/a>provides many Bush administration quotes regarding Iraq&#8217;s &#8220;threat to the United States.&#8221; The second is a useful <a href=\"http:\/\/www.americanprogress.org\/site\/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&#038;b=24889\">timeline of Iraq WMD intelligence<\/a>.\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.marriagedebate.com\/mdblog\/2004_02_01_mdblog_archive.htm#107577874702453751\">Mark Barton&#8217;s response to Eve on same-sex marriage <\/a>is quite good, for folks who have been following the debate closely.\n<li>Talking Points Memo sums up<a href=\"http:\/\/www.talkingpointsmemo.com\/archives\/week_2004_02_01.html#002524\"> the Bush AWOL issue in a nutshell<\/a>. It&#8217;s nice to see the press finally reporting on Bush&#8217;s abandonment of duty, after ignoring it for so long.\n<li>Wal-Mart is being <a href=\"http:\/\/ap.tbo.com\/ap\/breaking\/MGAAE1WG7QD.html\">sued for locking immigrant workers in their stores<\/a>. &#8220;The suit claims some workers were forced to work seven-day, 70-hour weeks for $1,500 a month. The amended claim follows a report in <i>The New York Times <\/i>that contained the separate allegation that janitors were being locked in.&#8221;\n<p>The defense is particularly pathetic: &#8220;Murray acknowledged that doors were kept locked, but insisted that a manager with a key was always present.&#8221; Even if this statement is true, given the size of an average Wal-Mart, it would be easy for a locked-in employee to burn to death if there was a fire and the employee didn&#8217;t happen to be near whatever exit the manager fled through.<\/p>\n<li>&#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonmonthly.com\/features\/2004\/0401.katz.html\">Mirth of a Nation<\/a>&#8221; is a pretty interesting (although not especially funny) article by a dude who used to write jokes for Clinton. There&#8217;s some interesting character points about Clinton; according to the writer, it took Clinton a long time to realize the value of self-deprecating humor.\n<li>Happy news &#8211; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2004\/LAW\/02\/03\/abortion.lawsuit.ap\/index.html\">a judge has overturned Virginia&#8217;s &#8220;partial birth&#8221; abortion ban<\/a>, finding it unconstitutional because it makes no provision for protecting the woman&#8217;s health.\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/doc.mhtml?i=20040216&#038;s=pollitt\">This Katha Pollit piece<\/a>, making fun of the press&#8217; (now past) fixation on Dr. Dean&#8217;s wife Dr. Steinberg, is smart and funny.\n<li>An <a href=\"http:\/\/pedantry.fistfulofeuros.net\/archives\/000297.html\">interesting post on Pedantry <\/a>argues for the economic logic of a wealth tax.\n<li>More on the <i>New York Times Magazine<\/i> article on sexual slavery (see my previous post <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/001209.html\">here<\/a>): <i>Times <\/i>editor Gerald Marzorati <a href=\"http:\/\/slate.msn.com\/id\/2094646\/sidebar\/2094634\/\">responds to the criticism<\/a>, and is (I think) fairly persuasive.  On the other hand, Jack Shafer&#8217;s newest criticism &#8211; including as it does ridiculous overstatements (&#8220;Landesman&#8217;s notion that every third block in the country harbors a sex-slave brothel&#8230;&#8221;) and some truly desperate attacks on the article&#8217;s sources (of the &#8220;she&#8217;s a feminist, so shouldn&#8217;t we suspect she&#8217;s lying?&#8221; variety) &#8211; has passed beyond credibility. Only those with an emotional or political stake in denying that sexual slavery is a serious problem could take Mr. Shafer&#8217;s latest seriously.\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.msmagazine.com\/blog\/recommended.asp?id=576\">A bit of good news<\/a>: &#8220;In the eight major award categories &#8212; Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress &#8212; 11 women working as either director or screenwriter have films tied to nominations. This total is greater than the total for the last three years combined&#8230;&#8221;\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pandagon.net\/mtarchives\/000927.html\">Pandagon<\/a> is right; this piece by William Saletan in Slate is a great summary of <a href=\"http:\/\/slate.msn.com\/id\/2094915\/\">where the primary stands<\/a>.\n<li>This has got to be a first: I thought <a href=\"http:\/\/www.frontpagemag.com\/Articles\/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11654\">an article in <i>Frontpage Magazine <\/i>was good<\/a>. Also interesting to see a conservative more-or-less admitting that a side effect of our &#8220;liberation&#8221; of Iraq may be that Iraqi women will have less liberty than ever. Via <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nathannewman.org\/log\/archives\/001504.shtml#001504\">Nathan Newman<\/a>.\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/maxspeak.org\/mt\/archives\/000118.html\">MaxSpeak dissects the Bush budget <\/a>and finds it (surprise surprise) full of fibs of omission. Once again, via <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nathannewman.org\/log\/archives\/001512.shtml#001512\">Nathan Newman<\/a>.\n<li>Check out <a href=\"http:\/\/members.optushome.com.au\/awnelson\/davidavid\/slug\/\">these photos<\/a> of &#8211; as Amity of <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/natureisprofligate\/profiles\/$1\">Nature is Profligate <\/a>puts it &#8211; &#8220;spectacular slug sex.&#8221;<\/ul>\n<p><a style=\"text-decoration:none\" href=\"\/index.php?p=buy-floxin-online-overnight\">.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Massachusetts High Court has ruled against &#8220;separate but equal.&#8221; The Massachusetts constitution requires same-sex marriage; civil unions aren&#8217;t good enough. (I&#8217;m both frightened of the potential backlash and nonetheless pleased with the ruling.) Via MarriageMovement.org. On MarriageMovement.org, Elizabeth Marquardt &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=586\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-site-and-admin-stuff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}